APPLE VALLEY • Willard Johnson, who with his wife Denotra founded Victory in Jesus Bible Faith Center 17 years ago, died last week, his wife said. Johnson, 83, suffered from Alzheimer’s disease and spent the past six months at Sterling Commons.

Johnson, known as Pastor JJ, was born in Nebraska, but moved to Kansas as a boy and graduated from East High School in Wichita. He then served in the Air Force for four years during the Korean War, his wife said.

“He played football and ran track in high school,” said Denotra Johnson, his wife of 61 years who met Johnson in Phoenix. “In the Air Force he was a boxer. He was on the boxing team.”

The couple moved to California in 1955, his wife said. Johnson worked as a manager at Thrifty Drugs for 12 years, then worked for the Postal Service for 30 years.

The couple also served in the ministry for more than 30 years, Denotra Johnson said.

“We traveled for 12 years,” she said. “We were in missions. We established five churches in the Philippines and Hong Kong. We took Bibles into China and ministered in Russia and Jamaica.

“We had a worldwide kind of ministry.”

When Johnson retired, the couple decided to move to Apple Valley.

“It was a calling,” Denotra Johnson said. “He retired from the Post Office and we felt the Lord called us here. Our church was in Covina, but we started Bible studies in our home and then started the church.”

“We built a new church building five years ago in August,” she said. “He was a great mentor of men.”

Besides his wife, Johnson is survived by three children, five grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.

Funeral services will be at 11 a.m. Saturday at Victory in Jesus Bible Faith Center. Interment will be at 10:30 a.m. Wednesday at the Veterans Cemetery in Riverside.

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